Why you should be a Brilliant Communication Manager as a Product Manager

I have a believe in my life which I always say that 99% of conflicts, fights, wars have all started due to one main problem, we human being have: Miscommunication.

That is why I always ask all product managers if they are on this job to make the world a better place the first thing they need to make sure of is to also be a Communication Manager.

The first duty a product manager has is to make sure the communication is being established with clear transparency and clarity between all parties who are evolved in creating a product, which can be different stakeholders from different departments, your product “may” impact them, the peers, whom may have their product affected, the developers or engineers, the customer service team who are always front-liners, even to users and customers, and anyone who you anticipate at a point of time will be affected. Additionally as a product manager you do not also want to make sure everything is communicated enough but also over-communicated.

But what you need to understand about communication is that: it is NOT simple!

That is where the skills comes in. First of all you always need to know you can not use same communication tool for everyone around the table of your product, in addition not everyone follow same path in a dialogue. So then you need to have the skills and tools which can give you just a more confidence to make sure you have used all needed as a communication manager. Few of the skills that some come intuitively and some by practice can be listed as:

No dialogue can happen if there exists no Active Listening. You always need to make sure you are a good listener to be able to answer the questions and concerns. Active Listening does come a lot with practice and focus, and having the empathy to understand the point in the person in front of you. In my career I have seen many sharp product managers that due to their brain working all time or wanting to be the smartest person in the room lose the chance to be an active listener and that is exactly where they fail to make a smooth communication. Listening, and trying to understand, is what you need to always repeat to yourself as soon as the person in front of you starts to talk. And yes there are also moments you just need to “act” as an active listener :)

Looking at the best selling novels gives you the hint why you need to be a good Story Teller. The power that is within a good story can not be conquered by any random presentation. As a product manager you need to either be good at it or at least learn it. Human minds are made in a way that they always like to follow a path or they just get distracted so quickly that you lost all your change to make a bold communication. A hint for being a good story teller is to start from they WHY. They why is exactly where you have started so let it also be the start for others.

You may not like it, but as a product manager you need to be a good Negotiator. Convincing stakeholders with different stakes around a table does not come out if you do not use your negotiation skills. No project is delivered on time if you do not use your power to negotiate with head of engineering. The art in being a good negotiator is to have gathered all data you need, be a quick analyzer and decision maker to make sure you put the best deal on the table.

Last but not least a good communication needs also a good Presentation. The power of visual is not always as the power of words. Maybe that is the way our brains work that our eyes need to get caught by a scene so our ears starts to listen. As a product manager you need to have learned how to make a good presentation that have a story, contains enough data points (not little not too much), have more visualize than words and have a conclusion so can play the role of a good communication.

At the end as a product manager you always need to sound Persuasive, to leave an impact on your audience. No one will recall or even listen to someone who is talking with doubt. And this does not come if you have not already baked your data, build your story and have put them all together in one piece to get presented.

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